The important factor for an Existentialists (i.e. those who study the meaning and purpose of “existence”) is the freedom of choice to believe or not to believe.

Existentialists refuse to belong to any school of thought, repudiating of the adequacy of any body of beliefs or systems, claiming them to be superficial, academic and remote from life.

Existentialism may be defined as the philosophical theory which holds that a further set of categories, governed by the norm of authenticity, is necessary to grasp human existence.

Existentialism is a reaction against traditional schools of philosophy, such as Rationalism, British Empiricism and Positivism that seek to discover an ultimate “order ” and “universal meaning” in metaphysical principles or in the structure of the observed world.

Existentialism is a tradition of philosophical enquiry associated mainly with certain 19th and 20th-century European philosophers who, despite profound doctrinal differences, shared the belief philosophical thinking begins with the human subject ,not merely the thinking subject, but the acting, feeling, living human individual.

While the predominant value of Existentialist thought is commonly acknowledged to be freedom, its primary virtue is authenticity. In the view of the existentialist, the: Individual’s starting point is characterized by what has been called "the existential attitude", or a sense of disorientation, confusion, or dread in the face of an apparently meaningless or absurd world.

HISTORY

Existentialist-type themes appear in early Buddhist and Christian writings (including those of St. Augustine and St.Thomas Aquinas). In the 17th Century, Blaise Pascal suggested that, without a God, life would be meaningless, boring and miserable, much as later Existentialists believed, although, unlike them, Pascal saw this as a reason for the existence of a God. His near-contemporary, John Locke, advocated individual autonomy and self-determination, but in the positive pursuit of Liberalism and Individualism rather than in response to an Existentialist experience.

Existentialism in its currently recognizable form was inspired by the 19th Century Danish philosopher Søren Kierkegaard and the German philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche, although neither actually used the term in their work. The Phenomenology of Martin Heidegger was another important influence on the later development of the movement. It can be argued that Georg Wilhelm Friedrich Hegel and Arthur Schopenhauer were also important influences on the development of Existentialism, if only due to Kierkegaard and Nietzsche's opposition to Hegelianism and German Idealism.

Existentialistic ideas came out of a time in society when there was a deep sense of despair following the Great Depression and World War II. There was a spirit of optimism in society that was destroyed by World War I and its mid-century calamities. This despair has been articulated by existentialist philosophers well into the 1970s and continues on to this day as a popular way of thinking and reasoning (with the freedom to choose one’s preferred moral belief system and lifestyle).

Existentialism came of age in the mid-20th Century, largely through the scholarly and fictional works of the French Existentialists, Jean-Paul Sartre, Albert Camus (1913 - 1960) and Simone de Beauvoir (1908 - 1986), all of whose works popularized existential themes, such as dread, boredom, alienation, the absurd, freedom, commitment and nothingness.

Sartre is perhaps the most well-known, as well as one of the few to have actually accepted being called an "Existentialist". "Being and Nothingness" (1943) is his most important work, and his novels and plays, including "Nausea" (1938) and "No Exit (1944), helped to popularize the movement.Sartre claimed that a central proposition of Existentialism is that existence precedes essence, which means that the most important consideration for individuals is that they are individuals—independently acting and responsible, conscious beings ("existence")—rather than what labels, roles, stereotypes, definitions, or other preconceived categories the individuals fit ("essence").

The actual life of the individuals is what constitutes what could be called their "true essence" instead of there being an arbitrarily attributed essence others use to define them. Thus, human beings, through their own consciousness, create their own values and determine a meaning to their life.In "The Myth of Sisyphus" (1942), Albert Camus uses the analogy of the Greek Myth of Sisyphus (who is condemned for eternity to roll a rock up a hill, only to have it roll to the bottom again each time) to exemplify the pointlessness of existence, but shows that Sisyphus ultimately finds meaning and purpose in his task, simply by continually applying himself to it.

BASIC BELIEFSExistentialism is a movement in philosophy and literature that emphasizes individual existence, freedom and choice.

It is based on the view that humans define their own meaning in life, and try to make rational decisions despite existing in an irrational Universe. It focuses on the question of human existence, and the feeling that there is no purpose or explanation at the core of existence. It holds that, as there is no God or any other transcendent force, the only way to counter this nothingness (and hence to find meaning in life) is by embracing existence.

Existentialism proposes that individuals are entirely free and must take personal responsibility for themselves (although with this responsibility comes angst, a profound anguish or dread), and emphasizes action, freedom and decision as fundamental in rising above the essentially absurd condition of humanity (which is characterized by suffering and inevitable death).

Unlike René Descartes (a Skepticist ) who believed in the primacy of consciousness. Existentialists assert that a human being is "thrown into" into a concrete, inveterate universe that cannot be "thought away", and therefore existence precedes consciousness, and existence is the ultimate reality.

Existence, then, is prior to essence (essence is the meaning that may be ascribed to life), contrary to traditional philosophical views dating back to the ancient Greeks. As Sartre put it: "At first [Man] is nothing. Only afterward will he be something, and he himself will have made what he will be."

Most Existentialists believe that personal experience and acting on one's own convictions are essential in arriving at the truth, and that the understanding of a situation by someone involved in that situation is superior to that of a detached, objective observer.

When an individual's longing for order collides with the real world's lack of order, the result is absurdity. Human beings are therefore subjects in an indifferent, ambiguous and absurd universe, in which meaning is not provided by the natural order, but rather can be created (however provisionally and unstably) by human actions and interpretations.​Existentialism can be atheistic, theological (or theistic) or agnostic. Some Existentialists, like Nietzsche, proclaimed that "God is dead" and that the concept of God is obsolete. Others, like Kierkegaard, were intensely religious, even if they did not feel able to justify it.

SIMILAR PHILOSOPHIES

Secular humanism- is a philosophy or life stance that embraces human reason, ethics, social justice, and philosophical naturalism while specifically rejecting religious dogma, supernaturalism, pseudoscience, and superstition as the bases of morality and decision making.Secular humanism posits that human beings are capable of being ethical and moral without religion or a god. It does not, however, assume that humans are either inherently evil or innately good, nor does it present humans as being superior to nature. Rather, the humanist life stance emphasizes the unique responsibility facing humanity and the ethical consequences of human decisions. Fundamental to the concept of secular humanism is the strongly held viewpoint that ideology—be it religious or political—must be thoroughly examined by each individual and not simply accepted or rejected on faith. Along with this, an essential part of secular humanism is a continually adapting search for truth, primarily through science and philosophy. Many secular humanists derive their moral codes from a philosophy of utilitarianism, ethical naturalism, or evolutionary ethics, and some advocate a science of morality.

Subjectivism- 1. Epistemology-. the doctrine that all knowledge is limited to experiences by the self, and that transcendent knowledge is impossible.2. Ethics-. any of various theories maintaining that moral judgments are statements concerning the emotional or mental reactions of the individual or the community.

VIEW OF THE UNIVERSE

The Universe is a dark, disorderly, absurd place in chaos and full of dread and angst. The human individual, through free will, tries to give meaning and purpose and order to that Universe in chaos. In so doing the individual gives meaning and purpose to his own life and that of others.

PRACTICES Existentialism takes into consideration the underlying concepts:-Human free will-Human nature is chosen through life choices;-A person is best when struggling against their individual nature, fighting for life; -Decisions are not without stress and consequences;-There are things that are not rational; -Personal responsibility and discipline is crucial;-Society is unnatural and its traditional religious and secular rules are arbitrary;-Worldly desire is futile.

Existentialism is broadly defined in a variety of concepts and there can be no one answer as to what it is, yet it does not support any of the following:-Wealth, pleasure, or honor make the good life;-Social values and structure control the individual;-Accept what is and that is enough in life;-Science can and will make everything better;-People are basically good but ruined by society or external forces;“I want my way, now!” or “It is not my fault!” mentality.

Stanley Kubrick's 1957 anti-war film Paths of Glory "illustrates, and even illuminates...existentialism" by examining the "necessary absurdity of the human condition" and the "horror of war" The film tells the story of a fictional World War I French army regiment ordered to attack an impregnable German stronghold; when the attack fails, three soldiers are chosen at random, court-martialed by a "kangaroo court", and executed by firing squad. The film examines existentialist ethics, such as the issue of whether objectivity is possible and the "problem of authenticity".

Authors such as Albert Camus, Franz Kafka, Rainer Maria Rilke, T.S. Eliot, Herman Hesse, Luigi Pirandello, Ralph Ellison, and Jack Kerouac, composed literature or poetry that contained, to varying degrees, elements of existential or proto-existential thought. Books such as Do Androids Dream of Electric Sheep? (1968) (now republished as Blade Runner) by Philip K. Dick, Slaughterhouse-Five by Kurt Vonnegut, Fight Club by Chuck Palahniuk and Formless Meanderings by Bharath Srinivasan all distort the line between reality and appearance while simultaneously espousing existential themes.

Jean-Paul Sartre wrote No Exit in 1944, an existentialist play originally published in French as Huis Clos (meaning In Camera or "behind closed doors"), which is the source of the popular quote, "Hell is other people." (In French, "L'enfer, c'est les autres"). The play begins with a Valet leading a man into a room that the audience soon realizes is in hell. Eventually he is joined by two women. After their entry, the Valet leaves and the door is shut and locked. All three expect to be tortured, but no torturer arrives. Instead, they realize they are there to torture each other, which they do effectively by probing each other's sins, desires, and unpleasant memories.

Existentialist themes are displayed in the Theatre of the Absurd, notably in Samuel Beckett's Waiting for Godot, in which two men divert themselves while they wait expectantly for someone (or something) named Godot who never arrives. They claim Godot is an acquaintance, but in fact, hardly know him, admitting they would not recognize him if they saw him. Samuel Beckett, once asked who or what Godot is, replied, "If I knew, I would have said so in the play." To occupy themselves, the men eat, sleep, talk, argue, sing, play games, exercise, swap hats, and contemplate suicide—anything "to hold the terrible silence at bay". The play "exploits several archetypal forms and situations, all of which lend themselves to both comedy and pathos." The play also illustrates an attitude toward human experience on earth: the poignancy, oppression, camaraderie, hope, corruption, and bewilderment of human experience that can be reconciled only in the mind and art of the absurdist. The play examines questions such as death, the meaning of human existence and the place of God in human existence.

Tom Stoppard's Rosencrantz & Guildenstern Are Dead is an absurdist tragicomedy first staged at the Edinburgh Festival Fringe in 1966. The play expands upon the exploits of two minor characters from Shakespeare's Hamlet. Comparisons have also been drawn to Samuel Beckett's Waiting For Godot, for the presence of two central characters who appear almost as two halves of a single character. Many plot features are similar as well: the characters pass time by playing Questions, impersonating other characters, and interrupting each other or remaining silent for long periods of time. The two characters are portrayed as two clowns or fools in a world beyond their understanding. They stumble through philosophical arguments while not realizing the implications, and muse on the irrationality and randomness of the world.

By the mid-1970s the cultural image of existentialism had become a cliché, parodied in countless books and films by Woody Allen.

CONCLUSION

Existentialism is a dark philosophy. It sees the Universe as a disorderly, absurd place in chaos and full of dread and angst. The human individual, through free will, tries to give meaning, purpose and order to that Universe in chaos. In so doing the individual gives meaning and purpose to his life and the lives of others.

The notion of the Absurd contains the idea that there is no meaning in the World beyond what meaning we give it. This meaninglessness also encompasses the amorality or "unfairness" of the world.

This contrasts with the notion that "bad things don't happen to good people"; in the Universe, metaphorically speaking, there is no such thing as a good person or a bad person; what happens, happens, and it may just as well happen to a "good" person as to a "bad" person. Because of the world's absurdity, at any point in time, anything can happen to anyone, and a tragic event could plummet someone into direct confrontation with the Absurd. Karma has no place in an Existentialists Universe.

Marxists, especially in post-War France, found Existentialism to run counter to their emphasis on the solidarity of human beings and their theory of economic determinism. They further argued that Existentialism's emphasis on individual choice leads to contemplation rather than to action, and that only the bourgeoisie has the luxury to make themselves what they are through their choices, so they considered Existentialism to be a bourgeois philosophy.

Christian critics complain that Existentialism portrays humanity in the worst possible light, overlooking the dignity and grace that comes from being made in the image of God. Also, according to Christian critics, Existentialists are unable to account for the moral dimension of human life, and have no basis for an ethical theory if they deny that humans are bound by the commands of God (dogmatism).

Walter Kaufmann criticized “the profoundly unsound methods and the dangerous contempt for reason that have been so prominent in existentialism.” Logical positivist philosophers, such as Rudolf Carnap and A. J. Ayer, assert that existentialists are often confused about the verb "to be" in their analyses of "being". Specifically, they argue that the verb "is" is transitive and pre-fixed to a predicate (e.g., an apple is red) (without a predicate, the word "is" is meaningless), and that existentialists frequently misuse the term in this manner.

Colin Wilson has stated in his book The Angry Years that Existentialism has created many of its own difficulties: "we can see how this question of freedom of the will has been vitiated by post-romantic philosophy, with its inbuilt tendency to laziness and boredom, we can also see how it came about that existentialism found itself in a hole of its own digging, and how the philosophical developments since then have amounted to walking in circles round that hole”.

Some critics of Existentialism and Sarte says existence precedes essence. In that statement they are taking existentia and essentia according to their metaphysical meaning, which, from Plato's time on, has said that essentia precedes existentia. Sartre reverses this statement. But the reversal of a metaphysical statement remains a metaphysical statement. With it, he stays with metaphysics, in oblivion of the truth of Being.

It is the arbitrary act that Existentialism finds most objectionable-that is, when someone or society tries to impose or demand that their beliefs, values, or rules be faithfully accepted and obeyed. Existentialists believe this destroys individualism and makes a person become whatever the people in power desire thus they are dehumanized and reduced to being an object. Existentialism then stresses that a person's judgment is the determining factor for what is to be believed rather than by arbitrary religious or secular world values.​Like “Rationalism” and “Empiricism,” “EXISTENTIALISM” is a term that belongs to intellectual history. Its definition is thus, to some extent, one of historical convenience. To this writer that is fine. Existentialism is founded on the idea of a random, chaotic, disorderly and absurd Universe where everything is based on pure chance and circumstance and is influenced by individual existence, freedom and choice and existence precedes consciousness.

​All of that falls apart for me when one looks at and studies Sacred Geometry and Mathematics. Within the recurrent geometric shapes and mathematic formula that are constantly repeated throughout the Universe one sees the ordered and logical mind of a God, therefore, at that point, the base of Existentialism evaporates.